The Powell Endorsement: Overrated? Underrated?

October 19, 2008

My
predisposition is to be skeptical of the value of endorsements in
presidential general elections. Endorsements generally serve as an
informational shortcut for voters, and therefore their importance tends
to be inversely proportional to the stature of the contest involved.
When you're voting for Dog Commissioner, and you have no information
about the candidates, you might well go with whomever your local paper
decides to endorse. In a race like Obama-McCain, on the other hand, you
already have all the information you could ever want, and probably have
established a fairly strong preference for yourself.

With that said, Powell has approval ratings as high
as just about any public figure in America. His endorsement was
eloquent, unequivocal, and because of his role in the Bush
Administration, genuinely newsworthy. Powell's endorsement might play
especially well among the defense and military communities in Northern
Virginia, which just so happens to be perhaps the most important swing
region in the election.

And it comes at an opportune time in
the news cycle, with the McCain campaign having just started to feel as
though it had refound its center of gravity. Between this and Obama's $150 million fundraising haul, however, the sense of inevitability
may creep in again. Contrary to some observers, I think that there is
far more downside to the Republicans in resignation, fatalism and low
morale than there is to the Democrats in complacency.